"The Fall; The Grace; The Love"
Genesis 3:1-24
Romans 8:1, 28, 31-32, 35, 37-39
(After Reading the Scripture show clip from The Twilight Zone: The Howling Man 19:22-21:51)
"I didn't believe you."
"I saw him and didn't recognize him."
"That is man's weakness and Satan's strength."
In 2 Corinthians 11:14, Paul warns us that "Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light."
And in Genesis Chapter 3, Satan has disguised himself as a "snake" which apparently was originally "the most intelligent of all the wild animals that the Lord God had made."
And it is Satan who raises questions about God and God's intentions to Eve: "Did God really say that you shouldn't eat from any tree in the garden?"
He's trying to put a spin on God's command, raising suspicions about God's motives, and thus, planting a seed of doubt.
And when Eve responded, the snake dismissed her concerns.
Discounting God's warning he said to her: "You won't die! God knows that on the day you eat from it, you will see clearly and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
And in a sense, the snake told her the truth.
She and Adam didn't die right away.
They did see clearly.
They did become like God, knowing good and evil as God admitted in verse 22.
But the snake's words were only half-truths.
Adam and Eve did not die right away; but they lost the potential to live forever, and they were denied the Tree of Life.
They did see clearly, but what they saw was a startling picture of their nakedness.
They did become like God, only to be separated from Him."
And the snake did not speak again...
...but Satan speaks all the time...
...the humans, by their own free-will, set him free to go about wreaking havoc from that moment forward.
One theologian has written: "When they eat the fruit, their eyes indeed open, but this does not bring the result the snake promised.
They do gain the experience of deciding between good and bad, but doing so involves doing the opposite to what God said, so they do not gain anything like true wisdom.
They start off as naive, simple people, but when they decline to live by the one constraint God placed on them, they become not mature and wise people but stupid fools."
And we can all relate, can we not?
For we are all children of the Fall.
We are born into the sin which has been set free to rule the earth.
And we wrestle with this disease the rest of our lives.
And "The wages of sin is death..."
The Bishop of Liverpool England wrote this in the 1800's: "We are too apt to forget that temptation to sin will rarely present itself to us in its true colors, saying, 'I am your deadly enemy, and I want to ruin you forever in hell.
Oh no! Sin comes to us like Judas, with a kiss; like Joab, with outstretched hand and flattering words.
The forbidden fruit seemed good and desirable to Eve; yet it cast her out of Eden.
Walking idly on his palace roof seemed harmless enough to David; yet it ended in adultery and murder.
Sin rarely seems [like] sin at first beginnings. Let us then watch and pray, lest we fall into temptation."
What is tempting you this morning?
What has Satan been whispering in your ear this week?
Whatever it is, its aim is your destruction.
For God loves us more than we could possibly image, and Satan in his pride and jealousy, hates us more than we can imagine...
...he wants to do away with that which God loves and treasures most of all.
An author writes, "My 7 year old daughter, Jessica, is a deep thinker when it comes to theological questions.
Recently we discussed why bad things happen sometimes, re-reading the story of Adam and Eve and how sin came into the world.
Later that week, Jessica was ill and had to stay home from school.
Feeling miserable, she told me: "If Adam and Eve hadn't eaten the fruit, I wouldn't be sick.'
Before I could answer, she added: 'Of course, if they didn't eat it, we'd be sitting here naked.'"
In all seriousness, being "naked" in the biblical sense suggests poverty, misfortune, and oppression.
It also implies humiliation and disgrace.
Before the Fall, Adam and Eve lived in the Garden in a joyful innocence, naked but not ashamed.
They enjoyed each other without barriers, without self-conscious guilt that separates people from each other and from God.
But after disobeying God, they became vulnerable.
They were no longer children who did not know right from wrong.
Instead, they were now burdened with an insight that was now clouded by self-interest.
They would now start to manipulate their behavior or unabashedly "call evil good and good evil."
In verse 8 we are told that "During the day's cool evening breeze, they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden; and the man and his wife hid themselves from the Lord God in the middle of the garden's trees."
This is the moment when fear enters into the relationship between God and humanity.
We were never supposed to be afraid of the One Who wants to go for a walk with us.
We are told that "The Lord God called to the man and said to him, 'Where are you?'
The man replied, 'I heard your sound in the garden; I was afraid because I was naked, and I hid myself.'"
In all reality, Adam wasn't literally naked.
The first thing Adam and Eve did after eating the fruit was to "sew fig leaves together and [make] garments for themselves."
But again, their nakedness was their fear, their vulnerability, and the fact that they had become threatened by the Presence of the God that they had so wanted to be like.
In a nutshell, Adam and Eve, in eating the fruit, and obtaining the knowledge of good and evil, had developed a neurological disease.
They had become a bit insane.
And every bit of insanity and cruelty; every act of violence and hatred can be traced to this tragic, tragic event.
Anxiety and insecurity entered their world, their lives.
They were now paranoid and unable to trust the motives of our Good and Loving God.
A bit of hell would now be with them and us from now on.
It has been suggested that when God called to Adam, God wanted Adam to come clean, to confess honestly, not to be driven from the bushes but to be drawn out of them and back into relationship with God.
But rather than trusting the goodness of God Adam tried to protect himself, he became defensive and shifted the blame to Eve.
And in doing so, he claimed that he wasn't responsible for his actions because the woman had given him the fruit.
And this implied also, that God was to blame as well, because God had created the woman in the first place.
And Eve's response was just as disappointing.
She pointed her finger at the snake, instead of taking responsibility for her actions.
She and Adam created their own world of mistrust, trickery, deception and fear.
And in doing so, they condemned themselves with their own words.
They were still in the garden for a while, but it was no longer paradise.
They would never be completely happy or at peace again.
But although our love failed, God's love for us remained steadfast.
And right here in Genesis Chapter 3:21 we see God, charmingly and lovingly taking out the proverbial "sewing machine" and making the world's first leather coats...
...presumably from an animal that had died--very likely the first leather clothes were made from snakeskin!!!
This is the first instance of our loving and grace-filled Creator meeting us where we are in our natural sin-filled condition, and providing for our needs...
...in this case it is God making provision for the first humans who do not want to face the world naked.
Everyone is aware that we live in a world that is not paradise.
Human beings "fell short of the glory of God."
We failed to realize the possibility we had.
We failed to take God at God's Word.
We failed to trust God, and decided to trust Satan and make our own decisions about good and bad, right and wrong, in such a way as to ignore God's instructions.
We have declared our independence from God.
But again, God has continued to love us--even "while we are still sinners..."
Even as we are still snubbing our noses at God.
In the muck and mess we have made of this world and of our lives, God's compassion, God's grace, God's abounding love shines through.
Light has come into this dark world, and that Light is Jesus.
And to those who welcome the light into their lives, those who "believe in his name," God authorizes them to become "God's children, born not from blood nor from human desire or passion, but born from God."
And one of the amazing things about the Bible is that it not only tells us how things began, but it also tells us how things turnout...
...as John writes in Revelation Chapter 22, "Then the angel showed me the river of life-giving water, shining like crystal, flowing from the throne of God and the Lamb...
...On each side of the river is the tree of life...
...there will no longer be any curse.
...[We] will see God's face, and his name will be [our] foreheads."
Do you believe this?
If you do, you are in this world but not of it.
And you have access to a peace, which transcends the violence, the rage, the tragedies that we face in this life.
And you will live with God in Paradise forever because Jesus has born your sin on the Cross, dying the death you deserve...and being raised to life so that you may live!!!
South African Archbishop Desmund Tutu was once asked if he is really as optimistic as he seems.
Tutu's answer was this: "I'm not optimistic, no. I'm quite different.
I'm hopeful.
I am a prisoner of hope.
In the world you have very bad people--Hitler, Idi Amin--and they look like they are going to win.
All of them--all of them--have bitten the dust."
Remember what Mary Ella read at the beginning of this worship service?
"I believe that the present suffering is nothing compared to the coming glory that is going to be revealed to us.
We know that God works all things together for good for the ones who love God, for those who are called according to his purpose.
So what are we going to say about these things?
If God is for us, who is against us?
He didn't spare his own Son but gave him up for us all.
Won't he also freely give us all things with him?
Who will separate us from Christ's love?
Will we be separated by trouble, or distress, or harassment, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Praise God, Praise God, Praise God!!!
Amen.
